The Argosy — page 144: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A Romance of the Clotster. 129 But another conviction sent the blush to his manly brow and made his heart beat quickly. He was a poor man no longer and his com- panion was no longer a great lady. ‘‘ Etiennette,” he began at last, his strong, rich voice trembling with emotion, “ you are alone in the world, may I not now be your friend ? How could I tell you my secret thoughts before? You were an heiress about to re-enter the world, I a poor unlettered workman, earning my bread from day to day. But we are both orphans, out- casts together. I can speak unashamed and you are free to listen.” He clasped her slender hands in his, drew her nearer to him and whispered, ‘* This wayfaring life of the last few days, has it not been sweet to youasto me? Ah! I have surely guessed aright, though you will not sayso. Our bitter disappointment has turned to deepest joy.” She clung closer to him, but the stammering lips got out no word, the tenderly pathetic eyes refused to meet his own. Yes, to her also these wanderings had been a revelation ; she understood it all now. She loved too; she, too, was rich indeed. ‘‘ Never fear,” added the shy yet dignified lover, ‘“‘that you shall feel ashamed of your husband, unlettered rustic though he be. And your white hands shall not be roughened with toil. We will go to Algeria, and take the good Jeanne Marie with us. You shall reign mistress of a dainty home.” With one passionate sentence only she interrupted these fond speeches. ‘Give me straw to lie on, dry bread to eat,” she cried, ‘‘ only let me be free, let me be loved! And the prayer is not mine alone but one of many, uttered alas in vain. I should be too happy were it not for thoughts of my fellow victims left behind.” So that very night they took train to Marseilles, where Jeanne Marie joined them, and in a few years no settlers were more pros- perous than the pair whose strange but true story has just been told. COnNIClOOKS (SO